The lecture will take place online via Zoom. It will start at 17:00 and end at 18:30 GMT.
About the lecture
国产视频 (IIS) will host an online lecture on 22 April 2026 as part of the Islamic History and Thought Lecture Series (IHTLS). will examine the thought of 士Az墨z Nasaf墨, a major Muslim intellectual of the Mongol period, and explore his conceptual affinities with Ismaili cosmology.
士Az墨z Nasaf墨 (fl. 7th/13th century) was one of the most prominent Muslim thinkers of the Mongol period, whose works circulated widely and were translated from Latin and Ottoman Turkish to modern languages such as English, French, and German. Nasaf墨鈥檚 writings offer a particularly revealing case study of the intellectual entanglements and complexities of the Persianate Mongol world. Although a Sunni thinker, his work shows striking conceptual affinities with Ismaili cosmological texts from the AlamutFortress of the Nizari Ismailis in northern Iran, which fell to the Mongols in 654 AH/1256 CE. period. Nasaf墨鈥檚 cosmological vision was not merely an abstract intellectual exercise detached from reality, but a peace-oriented response to the sectarian fractures and political upheavals of his time. In this sense, Nasaf墨鈥檚 project reflects what shall be described as cosmological kinship, a shared intellectual grammar that traversed sectarian lines, even if deployed to different ends. As will be argued, although Nasaf墨 is often celebrated as an early authority who established monism (wa岣at al-wuj奴d) as an independent intellectual school, little attention has been given to his possible engagement with Ismaili sources from the Alamut era, which articulated similar intellectual and cosmological models and used almost identical language. This presentation situates Nasaf墨鈥檚 thought in conversation with the Ismaili tradition, and aims to re-center Shi士i intellectual traditions, which are often relegated to the margins, as integral to the broader debates in Islamic intellectual history during the Mongol era.
Speakers
Mohammad Amin Mansouri
Assistant Professor
Dr. Mohammad Amin Mansouri is an intellectual historian who specializes in Shi士i-Sunni relations, Shi士i intellectual history, Sufism, as well as the history of science in the Islamic world. He particularly focuses on the developments of Islamic thought during the Mongol and Post-Mongol eras in the Persianate world. Initially trained at an Islamic seminary in Iran, Dr. Mansouri earned degrees in Islamic theology and Western philosophy and completed his Ph.D. in Religious Studies at the University of Toronto in 2022. Dr. Mansouri is currently working on two book projects that aim to reexamine common assumptions about Islamic intellectual history during the Mongol era in the Islamic world.听 His papers have been published in the Journal of Qur鈥檃nic Studies, Iranian Studies, Journal of the American Oriental Society; Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Studia Islamica, and the Journal of Sufi Studies, among other places.
Moderator
Orkhan Mir-Kasimov
Associate Professor
Dr Orkhan Mir-Kasimov is an Associate Professor at 国产视频. He is Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and his teaching focuses on Islamic history, Shi士i history and thought, and Islamic mysticism. Find out more on Dr Mir-Kasimov’s research and publications.
Islamic History and Thought Lecture Series
Designed to invite scholars of various international academic institutions, specialising in intellectual, social and political aspects of medieval and early modern Islamic societies, to present and discuss their research.
Find out more
笔丑辞迟辞:听鈥鈥, Folio from a听Khamsa听(Quintet) of Nizami听Ganjavi. Calligrapher Ja鈥檉ar听Baisunghuri Iranian. Author Nizami. 835 AH/1431鈥32 CE.
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Views expressed in this lecture are those of the presenting scholars, not necessarily of IIS, the Ismaili community or its leadership. Promotion of this lecture is not an explicit endorsement of the ideas presented.
